Social Intercourse
by Caethilia Mordon
Summary: A New Zealander is invited to stay at Fowl Manor by Artemis's parents, who think their son needs to interact with more people his own age. No romance between the two at all, I promise.
1. Chapter One: The Self Titled Chapter

Social Intercourse

_A fan-fiction story written by Marie Hodgkinson._

**Chapter One: The Self-Titled Chapter in which Nothing Much Happens.**

Dorothea Danella Danielle Smith sniffed wetly and leant further back, as if trying to squish the concrete wall into a more comfortable shape. It wasn't as if she was homesick or anything. Of course not. She was probably just suffering culture shock from the water in the bathrooms going down the sink the wrong way. Duh.

Refusing to believe that she had just thought such a- such a (stupid-annoying-petite-blonde-younger-sister) word, Dorothea dog-eared the 42nd page of Douglas Adams's _The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ and, plagued by that sinking feeling you get when you are sure something has gone wrong and that you are stuck, alone, in a foreign country where everyone speaks with Irish accents, got out a stack of letters and started to read them for the umpteenth time. Or rather, she started to. First she pondered the word 'umpteenth'. What kind of a number is 'ump', anyway? Sounded like imp. Frustrated by the apparent insanity of the person who invented the word 'umpteenth', Dorothea shifted her attention to the first sheet of paper.

It was thick, luxurious paper- the word 'plush' comes to mind, although Dorothea rather thought that 'plush' meant soft and fuzzy, like a teddy bear or a kitten.

_13 June_

_Dear Miss Smith,_ the letter began, words flowing across the page like honey beneath an imprinted logo bearing the legend _aurum_ _potestas_ _est_.

_We received your communications on the subject of school exchange students earlier this year. Unfortunately we were at that time a little preoccupied with family matters, and so did not reply. Nevertheless we would greatly appreciate your considering spending some time around Christmas with our family. Please do not take this the wrong way- I do not wish you to feel in any way that you will be obliged on your stay with us to spend every minute of the day with my son Artemis, but his father and I have been rather perturbed to discover recently that Artemis has little or no social interactions with people his own age. We think it would be nice for him to have someone around to talk to, and from the profile your school sent us, you seem perfect! _Dorothea remembered that profile with a shudder. It described her as 'A quiet, studious young woman who is friendly with everyone and a joy to be around'. Sure she was a joy to be around- teachers were always overjoyed to be around students who aren't trying to blow up the school and sow the rubble with peanuts. She didn't even want to think about the accompanying photo (school I.D. – the photographer had a great talent for making the prettiest and soberest teenagers look like stoned eighty-year-olds).

_Please RSVP soon, Miss Smith. Oh, and before I forget- congratulations on your success in your Shakespeare Festival!_

_Yours sincerely,_

_Angeline_ _Fowl_

That had been the start of it, Dorothea supposed. Well, almost the start. The real start had been back in February, when her new English teacher had struck upon the ingenious idea of having her students improve their formal letter-writing skills by applying for short student exchanges to foreign countries. It hadn't ended well; until Dorothea received her reply in June, the only successful applicant had been Mike, whose aunt had agreed to let him stay at her house in Auckland for a few weeks of term time. Mrs Wilson had not been impressed, and Mike had been saddled with so much homework that he had to pay $20 for the extra luggage weight. After that, Mrs Wilson had given up on enterprising ways of emptying her classroom while students learnt culture in a foreign country, and the class was set a long list of dusty old books to read over the year.

Until the letter had arrived for Dorothea. Mrs Wilson almost died of shocked delight- _her_ model student, going off to stay with a load of Irish bigwigs on the other side of the world! The honour of it! The joy! The once-in-a-lifetime opportunities!

The convincing Dorothea's parents to let her go.

Once that strenuous ordeal was accomplished, chaos reigned. Letters were written, rewritten, attacked by viruses, handwritten, used to mop up coffee spills, re-handwritten, laminated and eventually a reply was sent to Mrs Angeline Fowl. Fundraising, that nemesis of all respectably lazy teenagers, provided Dorothea with enough money for the trip and the acquaintance of a friend of a mother of a step-sister of an ex-boyfriend of another friend of her father's supplied her with a discount on her plane fares. Dorothea had replied another beautifully scripted letter telling her how _absolutely delighted_ Mrs Fowl was that Dorothea could stay with them for a few weeks. Lengthy telephone conversations between Mrs Fowl and Mrs Smith ensued- none, thankfully, paid for by the latter. Toll calls to friends in Canterbury cost enough, let alone halfway across the world!

And then it had happened.

And now she was here. Two weeks and three days before Christmas, and she was sitting in some Dublin airport surrounded by luggage and being leered at by spotty porters who, unfortunately, weren't put off by her dripping nose. What fun.

---

**24.04.06 Well, there we go. All pretty and properly formatted. Have not yet dared to reread it. Tra la la. . .**


	2. Chapter Two: A Very Short Chapter in whi...

**Chapter Two: A very short chapter in which Dorothea buys a Box of Tissues.**

_Well, I guess public toilets are the same everywhere,_ thought Dorothea, wiping her hands on her cords. As in public toilets everywhere, there was a severe lack of hand- or paper-towels in the vicinity and the air-blasting-hand-dryer thing was Out of Order. She scuffed her way through the door, sniffing. Good posture be damned; no one should have to sit with a ramrod back at this hour.

Eleven o'clock at night, according to the clock on the wall. Dorothea started to check her watch. Discovering that she had already reset her watch to Irish time, she pretended that she had been scratching her wrist and looked around to see if anyone had noticed. No one was looking at her except a spotty porter on the late shift. Realizing that her tummy was writing her an official letter of complaint, she made her way over to the airport café.

A few unfamiliar coins- 'Euros'- supplied Dorothea with a steaming cup of hot chocolate, a warm double-chocolate muffin doused in chocolate sauce and (At last!) a box of tissues. She walked back to her seat, with better posture now that she had chocolate to eat.

Where were her hosts? This was past plagues of butterflies in her stomach; this was man-eating locusts buzzing through her gut. Something was sticking into her head. Dorothea reached around to the back of her head- oh. A bobby pin had come loose from her military ponytail and was trying to perform acupuncture on her head.

She scratched her head. Ooh, that was better. Several more pins came loose and a tuft of Dorothea's hair fluffed out of its bindings.

"Excuse me." A boy spoke scornfully from somewhere above her left ear. "Are you Dorothea Smith?"

---

**24.04.06 Again, copy-pasted to a blank Web page instead of normal page, and all is fixified.**


	3. Chapter Three: in which Dorothea meets a...

**Chapter Three: in which Dorothea meets and assesses our** **favourite** **young genius**

Dorothea Danella Danielle Smith looked up and to her left.

Standing in front of her to her left was an old man in a teenage boy's body. Artemis Fowl Junior may have been only fourteen years of age, but the frown wrinkles (frown wrinkles occur when someone doesn't have enough reasons to acquire laugh lines) around his eyes and his haughty stance gave him the appearance of a workaholic in his late forties. It was eerie.

Added to that was the unfortunate fact that this particular young man was reasonably good-looking.

_Oh, hell, _thought-groaned Dorothea. _This guy's wearing a suit and…_ she suddenly became acutely aware of the water stains on her traveling jeans, a sticky whisper on her cheek that might turn out to be chocolate sauce and, oh shite, she was still scratching her head like she had lice or something. She quickly dropped her hand.

"Um… yeah. That's me- er, I'm her. Um. Hello." The boy's face stayed carefully expressionless and Dorothea felt her face light up like a torch. "Who are- um, wait, are you- um-"

"Fowl. Artemis Fowl. The second."

"Hey, cool how you say your name, y'know, like _Bond, James Bond_ and all that. Hey, you've got the suit too, that's… cool…" Dorothea's voice trailed off to join her self respect in oblivion. This boy was clearly not the type to stand in front of a mirror pointing an imaginary revolver at his reflection. Looking at his pale face Dorothea was suddenly struck by the thought: _He probably doesn't _have _a reflection._

_No, that's mean. He's upset because his parents are trying to hook him up with some hick from stick land,_ replied her peacemaker side.

_Bull! _Put in a bolshy, nasty voice. _He's just bitter. Bitter! Bitter!_

_Yes, and you're just the sweetest thing since coffee sugar are you? Get over yourself._

_Nah! Don't listen to them, girl, you're better than that. New Zealand_ _ain't stick land and you're no hick. Stick up for yourself, mate!_

_Bitter!_

_Bitter and _rich _Get gold-digging, Dorothea! Woo! _

_Oh, come on, like she could gold-dig even if she wanted to. We're talking about Miss Anti-Romance 2003 here. You heard of animal magnetism? Dorothea's got that but the wrong way around, guys zoom away from her at the speed of thought._

_Excuse me, who are you all?_ thought Dorothea Danella Danielle Smith. _And would you mind getting out of my head? _

…

…

…

…

_Bit-_

_OUT!_

…

…

…

…

…

_Oh, thank god._

The exchange that just took place did so at the speed of thought- that is, it only took 1.23649642 seconds, giving Artemis Fowl enough time to raise his eyebrow skeptically at Dorothea and wheel around to walk back over to his parents. Angeline and Artemis Fowl (Sr.) were scanning the other side of the airport in search of their missing guest. Lurking a few metres behind them was their son's bodyguard; Butler.

"Mother, Father," Artemis had reached his parents, Dorothea lagging behind a bit. "This is Miss Smith." He barely even bothered to conceal the contempt in his voice.

"Um… hi."

"Dorothea! Oh, it's absolutely wonderful to see you at last," gushed Mrs Fowl. "Dear…" she turned to her husband, "This is Dorothea Danella Danielle Smith. You remember I told you, she'll be staying with us for a few weeks. Oh, Dorothea- it's a bit much to say your full name, isn't it- Dorothea, we're so sorry to be this late, everything seemed to be going wrong this morning…"

"S'OK," mumbled Dorothea, set off balance by the attractive lady's friendliness. The father didn't look too bad either- Artemis must just be a black sheep. Baa.

"Oh, but you look like you're falling asleep on your feet, dear! We really must get home, Juliet expected us back hours ago but traffic was so awful. I'll show you to the car, no, don't worry about those, Butler will take your bags…"

Dorothea allowed herself to be shepherded through doors and gates to a car. This was the type of car teenagers dreamed about when they flicked through their long-hoarded pay packets, the type of car most of them would never even be a passenger in. Those teenagers would have gaped in horror to see Dorothea stumble onto the soft leather seats, creasing their immaculate cushions as that huge man- Butler?- drove them out onto the highway.

In fact, only one thing about the ride to Fowl Manor struck her as extremely odd. As she dozed off to sleep she saw a mass of fluffy white buttons floating down to rest on the countryside. _Snow?_ she thought. _Snow at Christmas?_ _It's not just postcards, then!_

---

**24.04.06 Dum de doo… pretty short chapters, these, aren't they? Bad past-me.**


	4. Chapter Four: Baths, Breakfasts and othe...

**Chapter Four: Baths, Breakfast and other things beginning with B**

Dorothea opened her eyes. She hadn't just woken up- oh no. she'd been awake for at least the last hour, thinking happy thoughts and trying to will herself back to New Zealand. You see, as soon as she'd woken up she'd realised that she had forgotten her toothbrush. It was a brilliantly bright blue toothbrush, bought especially for her trip, and Dorothea could have kicked herself for forgetting it.

She did, and all the sheets and blankets on her bed fell onto the floor.

This was fantastic. Utterly, completely, I-would-rather-take-a-bath-in-a-pit-full-of-huhu-grubs-ly WONDERFUL. Perhaps fuzzy teeth were fashionable in Ireland.

Ireland! The Emerald Isle! Leprechaun Land! Home of Guinness! And… home of that boy…

Oh, cripes. Him.

Well, Dorothea wasn't going to give that snobby -person- the satisfaction of taking up her thoughts. Very quickly she thought about little brown kiwis, albatrosses, beetles, cats, scissors, octopi, croissants, Freedom Fries (snort), sunflowers and hot air balloons. Having thus removed the pale git from her mind, Dorothea set about finding out where she was.

A large, spacious room that would have been light if the curtains had been open. Well, that was simple. Now for some more detail-

She was lying down on, no, sitting up on (to get a better view of the room) an extremely comfortable bed with no bedclothes on it. They were on the floor, and were a pleasant peachy colour. The duvet was less peachy and more reddish, which matched the frills on the three pillows.

_Oh, for god's sake_, _not _frills, thought Dorothea. _That's the type of thing Maria…_ She stopped herself. This was a holiday; she would not think about her sister. Not at all.

Definitely not.

Especially not the way she always-

SHEEP BANANAS FROGS HATS CASTLES SCOTLAND BROKEN GLASS ART CLASS TEACHERS CHICKENS BUFFALO, she thought severely. And that took care of that.

"Hey, hello? Helloo-oo? You awake in there?" A blonde head erupted through the doorway behind Dorothea, followed rapidly by a shorts-and-singlet-top clad, athletically toned body. Dorothea's over-enthusiastic SkankRadar went haywire. "Just got in from training with big bro," the older girl continued. "Bit whoofy so I'll stay back, but here's your breakfast. Bathroom's through that door. See you in, what, an hour?" With that, Juliet Butler ran back out the door, horrified with herself. She'd probably scared the girl senseless. They probably didn't have glitter mascara in New…New Sea-land, or whatever it was.

…

Dorothea gaped. Then she quickly stopped, and attacked the meal that the strange girl had left her.

Croissants, camembert, check. Orange juice, check. Napkin- Napkin! This was like being at a restaurant!- check. Dorothea munched away at her favourite meal in bliss, then corrected herself. This was not like being in a restaurant. She had never been in a restaurant in her pyjamas.

Pyjamas!

How had she gotten into her pyjamas!

The last thing she remembered was falling asleep in the car… no, best not to think about it. Repress the memory. Repress the memory. Don't think about pink hippopotami wearing tutus.

Now, there was a disturbing thought.

To clear her mind- or at least, to clutter it up so that a few disturbing thoughts would get pushed back into oblivion- Dorothea went into the bathroom. Even after the subtle, stylish sophistication of her bedroom, she was flabbergasted.

The room was decorated to match the connecting bed chamber, but creamier. Dorothea wriggled her toes in the deep rug, gaping again. She couldn't take it all in. She felt like Beauty exploring the Beast's castle- except she couldn't remember there being any bathrooms in that movie. But here… here, there was an enormous sea-shell of a bath with bottled fragrances lined up along its edge, a sparkling white sink underneath a huge mirror, a toilet (necessary in any bathroom), a shower, and when she looked inside a cupboard she found rows of scented soaps, shampoos, conditioners, facial cleansers… but no toothbrushes.

Dorothea did the only thing that seemed proper in the circumstances. She had a bath.

---

**24.04.06 Reloaded. Gosh, took me a while to figure out I was doing things incorrectly, didn't it?**


	5. Chapter Five: Contact Part One

**Chapter Five: Contact (Part One)**

Dorothea screamed in frustration as her hairbrush struck another knot. Once upon a time she had been tempted to just hack the whole lot off, but according to her hairdresser the only thing keeping her locks from forming a halo around her head was their weight. If she chopped even a little off, she'd be giving the ceiling a free dusting every time she walked anywhere indoors. That was why she had pinned it into a manageable ponytail for the plane trip: the last thing she needed was to get her hair stuck in the overhead lockers.

Ten minutes of patience, perseverance and several choice phrases saw Dorothea's hair brushed flat down her back. Deciding as she looked in the huge bathroom mirror that none of her pimples were visible from more than half a metre away, she ambled back into the bedroom- her bedroom, for the next few weeks- put on some fresh clothes and ventured out into the hallway.

A quarter of an hour later she found herself outside her bedroom again.

Where had she gone wrong? Well… she'd turned left at the first corridor intersection, right at the second, straight ahead through a green room with lots of books in it, had doubled back at the locked door, had turned left and left and right and left and found herself back where she'd started. It was worse than her first day at high school.

At least there had been other people at high school! Sure, they had been loud, obnoxious, mufti-wearing 7th formers who gaped openly at Dorothea's horizontal hair, but she'd been able to stammer up the courage to ask one of the shorter ones where room 352b was.

(One of the stranger aspects of Dorothea's school was the room numbers. The numbers of the rooms started at 342a and finished at 399.75h. The letters stuck on the end didn't actually mean anything. This sort of thing was very confusing for the Year 9 Dorothea, but the uniform was worse.)

After taking a few deep breaths to calm down, Dorothea steeled herself and set off again, this way in the opposite direction. She was beginning to feel a bit depressed. Even without the disturbingly maze-like layout of the building, everything around Dorothea shouted '_I have so much money that I can buy a Picasso and use it to decorate my broom cupboard. Be awed! Be overwhelmed! Think about the preschool finger-paintings on your walls at home and wince!_

And wince Dorothea did. But she also thought, '_What is the point of all this… splendour… if THERE IS NOBODY HERE?_ _There's no point! Why even have such a big house? Worst of all, why leave me here without little arrows on the floor showing me where to go, like they have at the airport?'_

She's come to the locked door again. Presumably if she went back and then right and right and left and right again, she would end up somewhere that was not her bedroom. Or was it left then right then…

'_I should've saved some of that croissant,'_ thought Dorothea gloomily. '_I could've done a Hansel and Gretel. Or maybe I could've used bars of soap instead. After all, there were several hundred in that bathroom.'_ Indeed, Dorothea had sampled so many of those scented guest soaps that she was being followed around by a cloud of flower perfumes strong enough to kill cockroaches at ten paces. She leant against the locked door and tried to remember which way she'd come.

The door opened.

From her new viewpoint on the floor, Dorothea looked up at two midnight-blue eyes staring down at her in shock. After the time it takes a mosquito to buzz the eyes regained their usual haughty expression.

'_Oh, no', _thought Dorothea. '_Not him!'_

Several moments went by as the teenagers looked at each other. Finally Artemis spoke:

"As I sincerely doubt that you could give me an acceptable answer, I will not even ask for what purpose you are lying on the floor. I suspect, however, that my parents are waiting in the living room to better make your acquaintance. Follow me; unless, of course, you would prefer to remain on the floor," the boy added scathingly before stalking off down the hallway.

Dorothea scrambled clumsily to her feet and scurried after him, brushing nonexistent dust off the seat of her pants with one hand and checking her hair with the other. It was only sticking out at 45˚ today: hooray!

Artemis was giving off a particularly cool aura, so she didn't try to talk to him. Cool? The guy was practically an iceberg! A walking, talking iceberg imported straight from Antarctica.

He led Dorothea down corridor after corridor, and past enough hand-woven rugs for her to trip and crash into furniture eight times. One time her hair got caught in an ornate silver lamp and he waited, scowling, as she untangled herself. Another time, Dorothea was so distracted by the sight of snow-covered grounds out the window- snow, in December! - that she walked into the doorframe instead of the door.

At last they reached the living room.

Mr and Mrs Fowl had been waiting for their young guest for an hour or too, but after the first half hour they had realised that their house may have been a little overwhelming for the girl and weren't too bothered by the time she spent getting up. After all, it gave them more time to plot ways of making sure Artemis and Dorothea spent some time together. His reaction to her last night had been… less than welcoming, but they believed that there was still hope left for their son's social health. The door opened.

"Artemis, Dorothea!" Angeline gushed, sweeping them both into a hug. Dorothea tried not to sneeze as her hostess's white merino scarf got up her nose. "We were just talking about you! Weren't we, Timmy? So-" she turned back to the children, "have you two got anything planned for today? Timmy and I are just sorting through the accounts, but if you two would like to go into town for lunch or something…?"

Dorothea couldn't help but feel sorry for the woman. She was obviously desperate for her son to make friends, while Artemis was just as stubborn to stay a- to stay the way he was. Dorothea quickly censored all the descriptive labels her subconscious was giving the boy. Well, foozles to him. Dorothea wanted to shop in the snow!

"Town sounds great," she replied. "I have to get some stuff for everyone back home anyway; they've already organized a lynching squad if I return home empty handed." Artemis glared at her, but said nothing. His mother worried about him, he knew that. It wouldn't hurt him to humour her until this… girl… went back to New Zealand.

---

**24.04.06 …and there we go. All finished, hurrah!**


	6. Chapter Six: Contact Part Two

**Chapter Six: Contact (Part Two)**

The atmosphere in the Bentley was so unhealthy that it should have been quarantined- or shot. Artemis's parents had stayed home to sort out the accounts- they had discovered several deposits equaling over three million Euros made over the last few years that they couldn't account for- so they had sent their son to show Dorothea around town. Artemis preferred not to be questioned about where those mysterious deposits came from, so he had not protested too much. 

Dorothea was wondering whether the fuzz on her teeth had invented the wheel yet.

And Butler was driving.

"So. . . is there anywhere in particular you would like to go?" Butler asked the mass of poingy curls sitting behind him. 

Dorothea fell back down to earth with a thump. She had been thinking about the meaning of the word 'foozles'. She was pretty sure she hadn't made it up herself, because she'd heard people use it at school, and in chat rooms and stuff. Hang on, shouldn't that be seen them use it in chat rooms? And what had Butler asked again?

"Oh. . . Er. . ." Artemis broke in over top of her:

"Considering Miss Smith's. . ._economic_ status I suggest we do not visit any of the usual shops, D- Butler." Artemis frowned. Why had his mouth pronounced a D? One would have thought that a genius would have full control of his speech. He continued; "Perhaps we could stop somewhere more suited to her budget."

Dorothea sent her companion a mental snarl. Obnoxious little nerd-boy. Yeah, so she got an amount of pocket money more suited to . . . to someone who really hated shopping, but he didn't need to be so 'look at me, I'm a snotty Irish genius-boy who spends the equivalent of your annual income on a pair of posh shoes for my snotty little feet, nyer nyer nyer'. She sulked until Butler had parked the car outside a small shop.

(Sulking is very easy; you just have conversations with the people inside your head instead of the ones outside of it).

* * *

The shop was . . . well . . . quaint. Cosy. There were small tables with doilies on them. Looking around, Dorothea saw the proprietor: a sweet-looking old lady with a doily on her head. Hearing the merry jingle of the bell above the door, Dorothea turned around and hid a snort (she disguised it as a cough). Artemis's sullen visage hardly matched the room's décor. In fact, the flowery pink wallpaper gave his pale face the disturbing hue of squished unripe strawberries.

Dorothea walked over to a display of knitted leprechauns, swishing her hips to one side to avoid knocking over a table full of fawn-brown fudge. Yes! These would be perfect gifts! Very Irish, and without the tacky factor that you got when you bought plastic shamrocks from souvenir shops. Unfortunately, they also lacked the affordable factor that generally came with those shops. 

But. . . She had to have those leprechauns! They were so adorable! They were the type of thing that Dorothea's friends would coo over for hours, and that would doubtless be confiscated by a teacher. Then they would have to launch a Top Secret Rescue Mission! But. . . Money money money. . . 

Must be funny. . .

_In a rich man's world. Man, that was a weird old song. She must have heard it on one of her dad's old cassette tapes. But how could she get enough money to buy the leprechauns?_

. . .

. . .

There must be _some_ way. . . Ohhh. Dorothea gave herself a mental tap on the head as she thought up an answer to her financial problem.

She looked over at Artemis. He looked very dead. No, make that very _undead. Like an evil teenage vampire but without the sexiness usually attributed to the species. Good looks, yeah, but that was sort of completely nullified by everything else about him, starting with his scowl. Some fellahs could make scowls look nice, but not Artemis. This wasn't helping Dorothea's failing stock of courage as she ambled up to him._

"Hey, Artemis. . ." Dorothea bit back the urge to call him 'Mr Fowl'. _He looks like a teacher! He honestly looks like a teacher who thinks that students are brainless blobs but gives you 30-page essays on The Origin of Commas anyway! she thought. "Hey, um. . . wassup?"_

Both teenagers winced. Artemis winced because he despised being addressed in such an insolent manner and Dorothea winced because some things are just winceable. 

Dorothea stood silently for a few moments before realizing that Artemis wasn't going to answer. Well, fine. She'd be posh, then.

She had just opened her mouth to inquire as to the young man's state of health when a hooded figure burst through the shop doors and shot her in the arm.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

**Author's Note, don'tchaknow:** I grovel at your feet and beg forgiveness for not updating in so long. My excuse: So much has been happening! Pirates of the Caribbean and Finding Nemo finally came out! I had a 3-hour long Maths exam! I had a French oral NCEA internal worth 3 credits! I had homework! I have a life! . . . no, wait . . .

Er, anyway. Kittyrainbow, if you're out there (if you're on fanfiction.net. . .) here is an official note of recognition that YOU and only YOU are the creator of the whole "Looks dead . . . No, make that undead" thing. I couldn't resist. 

_Kittyrainbow__ created the whole "Dead. . . No, undead" thing. Go you!_


	7. Chapter Seven: Sleepybyes

**Chapter Seven: Sleepy-byes**

"Uh. . ." Dorothea looked down at her arm. A small red patch blossomed from the hole in her shirt and began to spread. It all seemed rather distant, really. Like it wasn't her arm. Maybe it was Artemis's arm. Haha. . .

"Wzzderfrg?" It must have been Christmas, because everyone was crowding around her like around a, a, a present. But she wasn't a present. What? Oh, it was time to go to sleep again. Good-night. . .

Artemis looked up from his examination of Dorothea's arm. "The wound is superficial. Butler?"

The bodyguard turned towards his employer, dropping the would-be burglar (who landed on the ground with a _plock). "Yes, master Artemis?"_

"Attend to Miss Smith's arm. Do not take too long: there are a few things I need to do before we return home." The pale youth strode out of the frilly shop.

Butler bent down- a _long _way down- to the unconscious girl. Artemis had been right, the bullet had just grazed Dorothea's arm. The missing chunk of flesh was nothing a bit of plastic surgery couldn't fix. What had been unsettling was Artemis's clinical assessment of the situation. The boy became more like the computers he worked on every day.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

**Author's Note:**

Holidays, sweet, blessed holidays. Hopefully this means I'll update more often, with longer chapters! So. . .

This was a very short chapter, wasn't it. Sorry. 

Now that I think about it, I will be doing a lot of sleeping, eating, reading, sleeping, movie-watching, shopping, sleeping, reading fanfics, watching videos and sleeping these holidays. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm, sleep.


	8. Chapter Eight: Cabin Fever

**Chapter Eight: Cabin Fever**

Dorothea was half-sitting, half-lying on her bed. It was quite difficult to read a book and dial a number on her cellphone at the same time as she was flicking channels on one of the Fowls' really big screen TVs, but she managed. Even though her arm was in a sling.

_Bring, bring_

_Bring, bring_

It was about 11p.m. Ireland time, so that would be, uh, not 11p.m. New Zealand time, Dorothea figured. Pick up, Bethy! Pick up the phone before I lose my mind completely!

_Click "'lo? Oo is't? 'M brshng m' teef!"_

"Hey-lo, Brushing My Teeth, c'n I talk to Bethy? I need her to help me find my mind."

"Urh, j'st a sec. . . _BEFFY!_" As usually happens when a telephone is changing hands in the middle of a conversation there were a few clonks, zizzing sounds, a muffled yell and a disturbing silence.

"Hello?"

"Bethy! You'll never guess what happened! Guess what happened!"

"What, you got a boyfriend? Wait, this is _you_ we're talking about, isn't it Dorothea? So, what happened, you get mugged by a leprechaun or something?"

"Close! I got shot!" There was a very, very long pause.

"You. . .You. . .Dots, that's not something to joke about!"

"Yeah, it really bites, eh. Not zactly a warm welcome to the Emerald Island, is it? Er. . . Is it Island or Isle?"

"Dots, get a grip! You, you can't just get shot and start talking about nicknames for, for countries! You're insane!"

"We've covered that already, Bethy."

"Well, well, too bad!" Dorothea wondered why her friend sounded so panicky. Her arm was fine. Well, it was fine so long as she remembered not to think about it. "Who shot you?"

"Euh, you know this's really dumb. It was just some random, I mean, not a gangster or anything. He was just after some cash to pay off his addiction, 'parently."

"The. . .the. . . _I'm GOING TO RIP HIM OPEN WITH MY TOENAILS AND PLAY HACKY WITH HIS SPLEEN!_ Stupid, ruddy, drug-fracked up pile of-"

"Nah, nah, not drugs, keyboards."

"What?"

"He's addicted to keyboards."

"Musical keyboards?"

"Nope. Computer keyboards. Funny ole world, isn't it?"

"I'll say. All right then, I'll rip him apart with my toenails, play hacky with his spleen and smash him over the head with a keyboard, 'cos _no one messes with my mates!" Bethy was beginning to sound like a chihuahua on drugs._

"Hey, hey, psyche it down. The guy isn't going anywhere, Butler _pulverized him. In a very professional and bodyguard-like way, of course."_

"Butler? Hey, do you have some bodyguard that I don't know about?"

"No, no, he's Artemis's bodyguard."

"Who's she? . . . Why are you laughing?" Dorothea tried to stop the maniacal mirth bubbling up inside her. God, it was good to laugh again. Especially at something as funny as a mental image of Artemis dressed up as a girl.

"Eheheheheheh… H-he's a _guy_, B-b-bethy. Snnhhahahahahahahahaha…"

"A guy!!! Ooh, a guy!!!" Dorothea blanched. Not that voice. . .

"Maria-Susannah. . . Why are you in this conversation? This is _my conversation." Bethy sounded shocked, too, so it hadn't been her idea. Of course it hadn't, Bethy wasn't as evil as that. She knew about Dorothea's sister. She wouldn't. . ._

"Like, _soooo_ Dorry, who's the _guy? Is he, like, __hot?"_

Dorothea ground her teeth as her sister's highly-pitched voice needled into her brain. Owwww…..

"So, hello? _Dor_-ry, what's he _like? Do you know his, like, email address?"_

"No."

"Was that, like, no he's not _hot_, or _no, you don't __know his _email address_?" _

_Ye gods, thought Dorothea. _She's learnt how to speak in italics._ "Um. . ." Artemis was mean, sure, but no one, not even Hitler, deserved Maria-Susannah. Well, maybe Hitler. She could've __Eeeeeeeee!-ed him to death before he'd got into power. Evil Hitler. If he was alive now, she would sic Bethy on him. Spleen-hacky!_

"Uhh… Maria, how did you get on here?" Disturbing visions of Maria snooping in on all her phone calls forevermore loomed up in Dorothea's mind. She would have to resort to using messenger seagulls for private talks. . .

"Oh, well, _duh_, I asked your _friend!" What friend? Spleen-hacky! "You _know_, that __guy you keep _emailing._ He, like, _linked _me onto Bethy's __phone line!"_

"Isn't that illegal?" _Thank you, Bethy,_ thought Dorothea. 

"Uhh… _illegal!?_ Oh my _god!! _Dorry_, you, like, __shouldn't be emailing people who __break the __law!" Conveniently forgetting that she had wheedled Dorothea's e-friend into doing so in the first place, Maria-Susannah's voice squeaked up another octave. _"Dorry-! _That's. . . that's. . . _So, _is this guy __hot, or __what?"_

Dorothea groaned. Over the telephone, it sounded like a dying elephant. "He's creepy. Like. . ." she tried to think of an example her sister could comprehend. "Creepy like when Mr Levade asked you where you bought your hot pink mascara, except all the time. And without the mascara."

"_Ewwww! And pink is, like, __totally not Mr L's __colour. That was _gu-ross._" Well, maybe not a perfect example. "_He-_ey, you mean _this _guy wears make-up __too?"_

_Right, bad example. And seriously disturbing mental images. "No! He's, uh, all smart and evil and pale and mean and he looks at people like they're things. Not people. You know, like they're characters in a, a movie or a book or something where you can just laugh if they get hacked into bits by madmen with machetes because you know it's not real. Type of thing. Like a miniature evil lawyer."_

There was a shocked silence from the other ends of the line.

"Oh. . .that's _freaky._ _Ew. Geez, I'm glad __I'm not there."_

"So, you're saying he's like us when we were watching Final Destination?"

"Yep."

"Euuuuuurghk. Hey- wait a mo'- oh, sheesh. Sorry, Dot, Matt wants to talk to your sister. Ring you tomorrow, OK?"

"See ya." Dorothea winced and turned the phone off as her sister's voice reached a pitch almost too high to be heard by human ears. _"OH MY GOD! MATT WANTS TO TALK TO ME! IS MY HAIR OK? EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"_

Well, that was all fine and dandy. Apart from the bit where Dorothea's arm was in a sling. And that she couldn't get to sleep and had to watch some random telling her to buy a home exercise machine that would make her look like a steroid-pumping weightlifter in 30 days, guaranteed, steroids not included. Bodybuilders were gross. 

Dorothea twiddled her thumbs. It was not much of an improvement on TV, but at least it was active. Sort of. Well, no. ew, maybe if she did it too long her thumb muscles would bulge up like a bodybuilder's biceps. She stopped.

What a boring life. Why couldn't something _happen to her?_

Well, something apart from being shot. That wasn't exciting, it was messy and annoying. And she'd fainted. How shameful. 

Dorothea lay back and counted sheep with scary eyes until she fell asleep.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

**Note:** Hah! A long chapter!


	9. Chapter Nine: Emailing Jack

**Chapter Nine: Emailing Jack **

_Clickity clickity click. Click. Click-a-click. Click clickety clickety clickety. . . click. _

It was lucky Dorothea only used three fingers and a thumb to type with. If she typed properly with both hands, the whole 'rest your arm until it's fixed itself' thing would be a real drag. _Click clickety clickety click._

This whole thing was getting on her nerves. _Click. The adult Fowls were being stickily nice, she didn't see the Butlers except when they brought in meals (the family ate had tea together, but other meals just happened randomly), and she hadn't seen Artemis since the whole souvenir shop fiasco. Fiasco. Not a word normal people though or said on an everyday basis, but there wasn't a thesaurus nearby and what else could you call what had happened? _Clickit. Click click clickety clicky click click.__

And her arm hurt. _Click._ Email sent.

So now she was dumping all of her troubles on the only guy whose email address she knew. jackthepumpkinking@spudemporium.spud. Come to think about it, his email address was _all she knew about him._

Nuts to that. Nuts nuts nuts. Mmmm, hot salted macadamia nuts. Very droolable. Ages since she'd had any. Better not to drool on the keyboard, so Dorothea left that train of thought to crash and cast around for something else to ponder. . .

Something _not_ food. Jack! Perfect. He was definitely not food. Food for thought perhaps, but not food for tummy.

Dorothea had met the self-titled Pumpkin King one and a half years ago when he had pointed out that she had spelt 'onomatopoeic' wrong on her website. A War of Words had ensued, with both sides suffering massive casualties by their opponents' linguistic ability. They had agreed on a truce for Christmas that year, as both parties needed to restock on dictionaries (not hard, noting the type of presents relatives are known for giving to academic kiddies). 

From the evidence of his emails, Jack was a teenager from somewhere near America. He was a non-smoking, vegetarian adrenaline junkie who excelled in physical education and languages. He wanted to join the police force when he grew up, so he could drive fast cars and not get a ticket. His grip on current events was almost as nonexistent as Dorothea's own.

Best of all (from Maria-Susannah's point of view) he had sent Dorothea a picture of him looking very swish. Dorothea had her doubts- it looked a bit like a doctored photo- but ever since, Maria-Susannah had been _very, like, interested! in her sister's mysterious friend. Maybe he was the one who'd messed with the phone line._

_Ding. Jack had replied to her email very quickly. Then again, he had said that he'd been confined to his room for some reckless driving; he was probably sitting in front of his computer 24/7, desperate for contact from the outside world._

She opened the message. _Click._

Hola, dottedline! the email began.

Your life bites almost as much as mine! We should look in for some muzzles, or pliers. You're in Ireland? That must be cool, I've never even left the country LLL. Sniff. Hey, if you send over a suitcase with airholes in, I could come visit! Or not. Mum'd probably blow her stack, and I'd have to clean up the debris, pronounced de bree. 

I must say your email cheered me up a bit. You're in Ireland, millions of miles from home, and you're cooped up in the house instead of running around kissing big rocks. Least I'm not missing anything special!

Sorry about the arm. Tell more about this evil vampire chap, eh? I've heard the name somewhere, memory needs a bit of a revamp. 

- Jack

Well, that was nice. Dorothea typed a few colourful phrases delightfully describing her thoughts on Jack's reaction to her crippled-ness. The reply was almost as fast.

            Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry. . . you still reading this? Moving right along from your completely ignoring my request for info on the foul Fowl fellah J I managed to remember who he is without your divine help. Apparently he's the latest in a line of rather bad eggs: arson, lawsuits, armed robbery, fraud, walking out on young ladies at the altar in favour of richer young ladies- you name it, this family's done it. One of them was a magistrate a few hundred years back, swindled half the country out of their lands. Nice friends you've got, mate.

-J

_Oh, dear, thought Dorothea. _I didn't know that. Well, duh, mum wouldn't have let me come if I'd known that.__

_Hey, I've got nothing to worry about. My life savings aren't even small potatoes to them. And they have a cool house._

_Anyway, that was just their ancestors. Doesn't mean Angeline and Mr Fowl are the same._

The computer dinged again.

Forgot to say, my dotty dotted line- the son's got a criminal record longer than my arm, and none of it can be proven 'cos they don't have any hard evidence. Art forgery, bank hacking, mafia connections, blah blah blah. . .

Be careful, eh?

Well, that should have been predictable. Slimy little brat! Even more reason to write spiteful things about him in her diary. She would start right away.

December 19, 2003

THIS DIARY IS CURSED WITH A REALLY DIRE DIARY CURSE. IF YOU READ FURTHER THAN THIS, REALLY REALLY GROSS STUFF WILL HAPPEN TO YOU. WORSE THAN STUFF FROM HEALTH CLASS. REALLY DIRE STUFF.

REALLY.

WHY ARE YOU STILL READING THIS? FRACK OFF, MARIA/MUM/BETHY/DAD/MR LEVADE!

I MEAN IT. _DIRE_!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

…

…

…

right, that should do it. thus begins the chronicles legend journal tale of Dorothea Danella Danielle Smith, as written down in my diary from Bethy which I really shouldn't be writing in before x-mas but what the hey, she can't tell because SHE SHOULDN'T BE READING THIS. anyway. 15 years old, 167cm tall, matchstick figure, dandelion hair the colour you get when you mix all the different colours of mud together and add a lot of dust. that was be, by the way. but since I'm the only one likely to be reading this, I would know that already. unless I get amnesia. so I'd better keep writing random stuff with my nifty new pen, also from Bethy. ta, Bethy. If you're still reading this, the fingerprint cannons should be kicking in about now. note to self- figure out what fingerprint cannons are. sounds cool, though. copyright! copyright! mwahahahahahahahahahaha! right. Never been kissed, never seen movie never been kissed, never skipped school 'cos p.e. doesn't count, ooh good ickle me, ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. . . like oddfellow mints and garlic hummus and chocolate, duh chocolate and everyone hates me 'cos it doesn't do anything to my lack of a figure I . honestly, big dire stuff for anyone still reading this. soooooooo. . . aargh that sounded like MS, buuuuurgh. 

the official beginning of the very secret diary of me, so frack off. THIS DIARY IS RATED PG FOR MADE-UP SWEAR WORDS, EVIL VIBES ABOUT RANDOMS AND FINGERPRINT CANNONS.

I am in Ireland. I was shot by some freaky dude two days ago and just found out that I am staying with a family whose son is a renowned crim and rather hot and really freaky and pale with black hair (like his parents) and blue eyes and is taller than me. He is a burgullatingly igglestastic conpranny chrack. Hah. And anyone reading this will not know what those things mean. Kidnap Mr Sandy Claws, lala lala la. . . yeah. Feel better now. Got a bit ggggggrrrrrrrrrrrrrr-ed up thinking about Mr Artemis Fowl II. 

I don't know why he has to be all mean and everything. It's really a bit of a shock. I mean, no one's ever been purposefully mean to me before. They all ignored me a bit, but they didn't talk to me for the express purpose of making themselves feel better (by being mean).

Meh. Hope he keeps ignoring me. Don't want to do something dumb like cry in front of him.

Stupid hormones. I hate crying.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Thank you, thank you, o my wonderful reviewers. Thank you, o people-who-make-school-holidays. Thank you, o thank you Tim Burton, for The Nightmare Before Christmas. And thank you, Eoin Colfer, for the Artemis Fowl books.

I'm in a very grateful mood at the moment. Could you tell?


	10. Chapter Ten: The Really Big Ugly Thing

**Chapter Ten: The Really Big Ugly Thing**

White. . . white blurry stuff. Paper? Yes. Cheek numb. Why's that? Oh. . .

Dorothea sat up, blushing. Well, one side of her face blushed: the side that had been smooshed on the desk while she dozed stayed pale and freckly. Desk? Oh, right. Desk that she'd been writing in her diary at. And there the diary was, underneath her nose, pages full of scribbly words and little caricatures of certain miniature crime lords. Heh.

_So, now what? Dorothea asked herself. _It's about, oh, ___six o'clock__ in the morning and you couldn't even manage to get back to your bedroom before going to the __land__ of __Nod__. _

_Nod?_

_Oh. . . it's some cutesy collo- collqui- thing that people say when they mean you fell asleep._

_But you're not people, Dorothea. You're you, the only, the unique, the One With Fuzzy Teeth, the. . ._

_Got the picture, inner me. Or whoever you are. I thought I told you lot to go away?_

_You will never be rid of us! We are the voices at the back of your head! We are the conscience that fills you with dread! We-___

_Y'all have some random theme-song._

_You said "y'all"_

_Didn't!_

_Did!_

_Didn't!_

_Did!_

_I thought "y'all"! Nyah!_

Realizing how pointless it was to have such a conversation with anyone, let alone herself, Dorothea mentally pinged the little voice far, far away into the horizon and stood up. She had better get back to her room before everyone else woke up, and have a shower. A shower would be _bliss._

But of course, given the labyrinthine layout of the Fowl manor, a shower was not forthcoming. Umpteen corridors (drat that word), several rooms and a staircase later, Dorothea found herself outside.

It was quite nice, really. Nice crunchy snow, nice cool air, nice- no, _beautiful velvety black sky. . . for some reason, Dorothea felt very, very homesick._

Not that there was ever this much snow at home, of course. Snow back home lasted, oh, one night at the longest unless you went out to the ski fields. Then it was great, mountains and mountains of crisp whiteness, bus trips out to the Remarkables or Coronet Peak. . . or back home, shoving fistfuls of snow down everyone's shirts. 

Dorothea tried to imagine shoving snow down one of her hosts' shirts. Nu-uh. Pity. . . 

She looked out at the snowy grounds again. The temptation was too much to resist.

+++

Artemis glanced out his study window and frowned. He had risen early in order to work on a particular task that needed quiet concentration- _not the yells and thuds of a teenage girl's unsuccessful attempts at making the world's fattest snow yeti. If that was what she was trying to shape._

He tugged the curtains closed and sat down in front of his computer workstation. If he could not work on what he had planned to, he would at least check that the various security devices he had installed around the house and grounds were working up to scratch. You could never be too careful. Especially after that unexplained incident with those unusual contact lenses.

The computer whirred softly as sensors from all over Fowl manor sent it their news. Seismic activity, air movement, heat, noise, air pressure, all were monitored constantly by Artemis's bugs. At the moment the only disturbance was that caused by Dorothea's artistic destruction. Her sculpture was now beginning to resemble the Sydney Opera House, with ears.

". . . Buttercup baby, la la let me down let me down, mess me around da da, worst of all, la la la, 's when ya don't call me when ya say you will (say you will) but I love ya still, da da da! Da da da, da da da da da da da da da da. . . Doo de doo. . ." Back at her school, Dorothea's voice had been classified as a weapon of mass destruction and the principal paid her a dollar a week not to join the junior choir.

She stood back from her work, red from the effort of singing and building at the same time. Her feet were beginning to get cold. Maybe it would be a good idea to go inside and warm up, before her toes went all black and ew like what happened to those trampers in the Himalayas. She turned and started walking back towards the house.

"Come, come, come on OOOOOOOO-vaaa, dah de dah. . . Um, whatever the next words are, dum de dum. . ." Stupid song. What was another song she could sing? Oh, right. "Some-_body_ once told me the world is kinda, uh, roamy? Um. I ain't the sharpest tool in the she-ed, hmm hmmm hm. . . ah, forget it." Now, where was her bedroom. . .

+++

The computer blipped politely. After a few seconds, it began to blip more urgently. Startled out of his reverie, Artemis glanced at the screen.

+++

Dorothea walked a few steps, then skidded and fell onto hands and knees. Funny- the snow wasn't all that slippery as a whole, and she'd been watching where she was going. Blighty growth spurts. It was hard to do anything right when your feet were moving rapidly away from the rest of you and you kept growing out of your favourite clothes.

+++

Artemis did not gasp. To gasp would be to admit he had not expected something like this to occur at some stage, and would give the impression he was at a loss as how to deal with the situation. That was not true. He picked up his cellphone and speed-dialed-

"Butler?"

+++

Dorothea wrinkled her nose so much that her vision blurred. She unwrinkled her nose. That was better. She seemed to be scooting from side to side on the snow without using any muscles, so with the slow logic of someone who is very, very cold and has snow down her back she deduced that it must be an earthquake. Cool. It'd been ages since she'd been in an earthquake- well, ages since she'd been awake during an earthquake. There were heaps in New Zealand, because of the . . . Hang on. Ireland wasn't on a fault line, was it?

Something erupted out of the sculpture behind her. 

+++

Butler hurtled down the stairs like a case full of pétonque balls, formulating a plan of action. If one of Artemis II's 'business associates' had taken advantage of the elder Fowls' absence to, well, tunnel into the estate with the intention of harming Butler's principal, they would no doubt have come prepared. Fortunately, Butler was also prepared. Panting slightly, he burst through a side door and focused his gun on the intruder.

A few metres away, Dorothea sat on the ground and looked up. . . and up. . . and up. . . The- _thing_- was really big. Really big and ugly. It looked like Bethy's brother after a hard night's partying: bulky, smelly, red-eyed and with horribly greasy dreadlocks. Huge dreadlocks. Like enormous hairy candles hanging off the thing's head and back.

It was- it couldn't be. It couldn't be looking at her. She felt her throat close up. It _was_ looking at her. Oh, dear. Tusks.

No. she was wearing white pjs. White against a white background, so it couldn't see her. Hah! Now. . . stay very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, _very_ still. Now it was looking away.

She bit back a sigh of relief. That would've been a really stupid thing to do. Making a noise just when she was reasonably safe. Only stupid people would sigh a sigh of relief at a moment like this.

Dorothea allowed herself a short snigger against the silly sighing people.

Oops.

Butler went into action as soon as he saw the creature's head swing back towards the teenage girl. Textbook shots, forehead then chest.

It didn't stop the beast, but it certainly diverted its attention. Safe for the moment, Dorothea crawled off at a cracking pace and burrowed into a snow boulder. This was better- no, it was worse- no, it was just that she was experiencing so much more head-throbbing-eyes-twitching-breath-catching-in-chest-muscles-tensed emotion right now than she had ever felt in any midnight game of Spotlight.

Something niggled at the back of Butler's consciousness but he ignored it. Any distractions right now could be fatal. Slowly, he moved one hand down to his belt and eased a stun grenade from his pocket. Madame Fowl had objected to all the weapons Butler kept around his person, but now it would pay off.

Dorothea really didn't understand why trampers stayed in snow caves. The one she had burrowed for herself was very cold. Then again, trampers had polyprops and woolen socks and swannies and boots and hats and gloves and little primus camp burners for making hot cups of sachet drink or tea on. They didn't wear white flannel pajamas. She tried not to look at what was happening outside her snow boulder. Tents-Arrows-Elves-Orlando-Pirates-Ships-Sails-Flags-Holes-Hobbits. It didn't work. This was worse than getting shot at.

Butler pulled the pin, swung his arm back and sent the grenade hurtling through the air towards the. . . Troll? Some type of ape, he corrected himself. This was no time to let his armoured tank of thought wander. He counted under his breath and took a step back.

The blast rocked the creature on its feet, but didn't fell it. Incredible, but not in the literal sense of the word. The beast's combined thick skin and mass of dreadlocks had doubtless acted as a sort of organic armour, absorbing the force and shrapnel of the explosion. Artemis watched on avidly from his viewpoint at the window. Amazing.

Enraged, the beast spun around in an attempt to hunt out its attacker. Why it did not simply rush at the obvious target- i.e., the person who threw the explosive device- Butler did not know. Possibly the blast had messed up its self-orientation.

It found another target. 

Dorothea screeched and held her pajama top in place as the thing held her aloft- upside-down. Was this what it felt like to be Fay Wray? She'd never seen the movie. She didn't even know the character's name.

She really wanted to be able to find out the character's name.

**Author's Note: This story takes up 43 pages, according to my computer. That beats my previous record of 14 by quite a long way! Alright, so I have lots of gaps, 1.5 spacing and lots of**

+++

, which take up a lot of unnecessary space, as my Mum just pointed out. Grr. At least it looks nice.

Oh, yes. . . who _is_ the character Fay Wray played on King Kong? I could always look it up or ask someone, but. . . nah.


	11. Chapter Eleven: Much Smaller In Real Lif...

**Chapter Eleven: Much Shorter In Real Life**

Dorothea was cold, and damp from snow-melt, and scared, and upside-down. There was also a distinct possibility that she would die with teeth fuzzier than dishes that haven't been washed for eight years. Fuzzier than the Petri dishes her class had used in their bacteria study last year. Fuzzier than. . .

The thing lifted Dorothea a bit higher and she got a proper look at its tusks.

_"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPMMMMMMMMMMMMMMEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"_

The creature stopped and growled softly, stunned. It had never before heard such a loud noise coming from such small food. Had its brain been larger than a shelled peanut, it would have ignored Dorothea's siren scream and Dorothea's story would have ended about here. As it was, the beast dropped her and started searching for a quieter meal.

Winded, Dorothea stopped screaming.

The thing looked down. It saw a young, juicy human female lying on the ground and picked her up.

_"BBBLLLLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOODDDYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTTTTTAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNNAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"_

Butler reloaded his weapon, but Dorothea was hanging in the way of all of the beast's possibly tender parts and shooting it anywhere else would be about as useful as cutting down a tree with a herring.

As he ran to get a better attack point, a bolt of light blue light burst out of thin air and hit the troll on the back of its neck. Enraged, it threw Dorothea aside and spun to meet its attacker. From her viewpoint of flying through the air Dorothea saw three more, brighter bolts hit the thing. She rather thought that they looked like flying light sabers. Then she blacked out.

And woke up again. Some sort of instinctual defence mechanism ordered her to get up and run far, far away from the great big ugly smelly mound of tusks and dreadlocks that was lying on the ground barely three metres away. 

"Hello." She looked around to see who had spoken.  Apparently, no one had. Or that was what it looked like.

"Uh. . . hi." Dorothea managed to gasp. "Are. . . are you my conscience?"

"Yes, Dory. I am your conscience. We haven't spoken in a while." There was a lengthy pause.

"You know, that was kind of scary how I just randomly said something from a movie and you kept on with the quote. Who are you?" He- it sounded like a guy, anyway- couldn't possibly be one of her normal head-voices. They were all female, and only ever quoted from art films or the Matrix. That was quite strange, as Dorothea had only seen the Matrix once and had fallen asleep halfway through.

"I'm. . .What? Oh, crap. See ya later, Dot."

"But I _can't_!" Dorothea whined loudly. A bit too loudly, in fact. Both Artemis and Butler were sending strange looks at this mad girl talking to someone they couldn't see. Then again, Dorothea acting slightly crazy wasn't the most unusual thing that had happened lately.

There was still the matter of the unconscious . . . thing . . . lying on the lawn.

Then it disappeared, too.

Dorothea made various surprised-and-my-tongue-isn't-working noises as her mind worked around this sudden lack of enormous tusky beasts. Another part of her mind was trying to tell the first bit of her mind that _hey, this is good, you're not being killed any more, life is sweet, isn't your butt numb from sitting on the freaking snow like a stunned fish?_

_Fish don't sit on snow,_ the first bit replied.

_Mexican walking fish do._

_No they don't. There isn't any snow in __Mexico__._

_Yes there is._

_Have you been to __Mexico__?_

_No. Have you?_

_No._

_Then let's just live under the delusion that __Mexico__ is filled with strange little fish with legs and colourful sombreros._

_That sit__ on snow._

_Right.___

_All right, whatever. Hey, my butt is pretty cold. Maybe I should stand up before my body heat makes the snow melt and the water makes my pj's go see-through, like what happens with school blouses._

_OK. Good idea._

                Dorothea was about to bring her anti-clothing-transparency plan of action into operation when the invisible voice-person spoke again.

"Greetings, mortal!" It boomed. Dorothea thought she heard a background whisperer mumble something unprintable. "I am your saviour, born of the earth and sky, my life's work to rescue fair damsels from monstrous . . ."

"Yeah, what is that thing?" Dorothea wasn't impressed by melodramatic announcements of demi-godliness. They got boring after three years of listening to her school principal's motivational speeches. "It's like, um, some type of mutated elephant-Chihuahua. You know, all mental like a Chihuahua. Um, how they're all psycho and agro and all.

"Um, who are you?"

The voice was silent. Dorothea felt her guts start playing Let's Give Dorothea Nervous Tummy Knots. Maybe the voice was some type of alien being and she had scared it away from Earth with her hair. Or her teeth. Probably her teeth.

She stood up and felt her head knock onto something hard. "Aw, what?" 

This was all getting rather disturbing. Land of crazy people this place may be, but Dorothea had no intention of joining the giggling masses. At least, she had no intention of admitting it to herself.

"O. . . K. . ." she began. "I'm just going over he-aaargh no, _this _way," the flustered girl stammered as she moved carefully around so that she was looking at a stone wall. If she couldn't see the invisible voice, it didn't exist. "Um. . ."

"Oh, _she-et._" 

As the voice proclaimed those words of wisdom, something thudded onto the snow behind Dorothea. It made quite a small noise, so she deduced that it was smaller than the, er, other thing. Which also did not exist. Of course.

After a few minutes the ghost of a kitten of curiosity began clawing at the very edge of her mind. Pretty soon it had become a stringy, mangy-looking feral panther and Dorothea _had _to, simply _had_ to just peek behind herself. It wasn't as if she would see anything, it was invisible, wasn't . . . it?

She looked over her shoulder.

She then turned back, took a few deep breaths, and looked again. There was no denying what she saw; after all, it's never been scientifically proven that unbrushed teeth are hallucinogens. Standing behind Dorothea was someone very, very short.

Someone, in fact, who looked much shorter in real life than he did in photos.

"_You!?"_ Dorothea gasped. Realising what she had just said, the startled girl amended: "I mean, 'You?' Because, ahah, it's not like _I_ can- oh, drat- it's not like I can speak in italics, that's my sister y'know? Um. You'll know all about her, 'cos if you're who you look like then . . . this is a bit embarrassing really. . . You're quite short, aren't you? Er-"

The object of her mumblings rolled his eyes at Dorothea and began struggling with the apparatus strapped to his back. "Is that . . . all the . . . thanks I get?" he asked, bending over backwards so far that Dorothea's spine started aching in sympathy. "Here . . . can you . . . undo this buckle?"

Complying, Dorothea poked at the offending mechanism until it snapped open, grazing her fingers. "Aargh. Thank you for what?" Free of his artificial wings the miniature boy swung round with flashing eyes and intoned as his answer:

"Thank me for saving your life, dolt! For tearing you from the very jaws of Hell, risking life and limb that you may live in safety, and if these accursed wings hadn't played up you would have spent your life pining for your mystery rescuer, your knight of the skies, your . . ."

"OK, sure. Um. You really are short, you know? Really, very short. Uhh. Yeah." Dorothea's eyes wandered, looking at everything except the boy who was Jack. Her eyes glanced over Artemis. He was standing stock still, like a wax sculpture that someone had stolen from _Madame Tussauds_ and set down in the snow outside Fowl Manor. His eyes were fixed on Jack. "So, um, what're you doing here?"

"I just _told_ you, Dots," he replied, and pulled himself to his feet. Even standing, he wouldn't have reached Dorothea's waist. As it was, with her sitting on the snow, she only had to look up a few centimetres into his face. "Rescuing you from that troll, of course."

"Oh . . . Right." Dorothea was still a bit stunned. Troll? As in those things that lived under bridges? What was Jack doing here, fighting trolls and being invisible and when he wasn't being invisible, looking like a metre-tall 'Stargate' commando, exotic weapons included? And why . . . ?

As Dorothea pondered the meanings and causes of these strange occurrences, Artemis was gradually snapping out of his reverie. It was a pity that neither Dorothea nor Jack noticed this.

"Dorothea, do you have some type of small screwdriver? Or some Allen keys? Um . . . your earrings aren't magnetic, are they? Oh, chintz, she's going to _kill_ me for this. . ." You see, obviously Jack had not come zooming down into the grounds of Fowl Manor by accident. He had, in fact, in the spur-of-the-moment type of thing which is to blame for so many disastrous, catastrophic and occasionally miraculous occurrences, cut class to ogle the home of- as the recorded warning on his helmet told him- the greatest ever threat to fairy kind. Just normal teenage behaviour.

"Er. . ." Dorothea's earrings were not only not of the magnetic sort; they were of the non-existent sort. Besides, her arm was hurting quite a bit by now and she wasn't really able to focus on anything else. Why did Jack want magnets anyway? It wasn't as though there were any fridges nearby. "Um, no. Sorry." Why was Jack so short, anyway? He didn't look as though he had dwarfism; he looked as though he had been sent by television onto one of those giant home theatre systems. It couldn't have been a proper TV, because he was still about a metre tall instead of really tiny like that squeaky guy on the movie. His hair was sort of red, so-

Dorothea abruptly forgot what she had been thinking about. Something about, unhh, red hair? What about red hair? Jack had red hai-

Jack had said something about magnets, hadn't he? "Um, no. Sorry." Why did he want magnets, anyway?

Something niggled at the back of her mind. Then it was squashed by the thought of fridges and stopped niggling.

"I do not suppose you would deign to introduce yourself, fairy?" There was something new in Artemis's voice; a hint of – triumph? "But of course, greetings would not be included in the LEPRecon training curriculum. Especially-" here his lips curled into that smile made famous by a certain aquatic predator "–_especially _not greetings directed towards the human who poses the greatest threat towards your civilisation since . . . shall we say, my last ventures?

I do not know what has brought you here, fairy, but whatever sentiments induced you to intervene right now shall not be repaid. Butler." At that signal, the mountainous Eurasian hurled a dull purple sphere at the ground between Jack's feet. An LED flashed on its surface and Jack dropped like a stone. He didn't move.

Dorothea screamed.

~  *  *  *  ~

Dorothea woke up to the rather unpleasant sensation of a thousand Morris dancers jumping around inside her head. Ignoring the italicised thoughts of her semi-subconscious as they ranted about what _they_ thought should be done with such folksy traditions, she tried to remember how she'd got to her bed after what had happened. . . had happened. . .

What _had_ happened?

Something. . . something about snow. And red hair- fridges? That couldn't be right. Never mind. The TV was blaring in front of her, some American ad for GlitzGlozz (the lippy that _everyone _wears, _dahling_) ; she must have dropped off in front of it. Click. The screen faded into blackness-

_Jack! The troll, the sphere, Artemis Fowl had _remem- ICE CREAM-HITLER-GREEN-SCHOOL-BROKEN-PLUGS-ELECTRICAL OUTLET-TESLA-LIGHTNING-GLASS.

Dorothea shook her head, annoyed. She couldn't even remember what she'd watched last night. What a waste of an evening. Ah, well- it was almost half past nine, and breakfast beckoned.


	12. Chapter 12: The Nameless Chapter of Inbe...

**Chapter Twelve: In which you will have to read the chapter to find out what happens in it, because the author has a mental block at the moment. But there is a party.**

Heatless winter sunlight poured through the conservatory windows and Dorothea shifted uneasily. She'd spent most of the morning mentally scratching at something just out of reach, and, like the perfect adjective, it had kept itself well screwed onto the other side of an adamantium wall. It had already taken the enjoyment out of her avocado-and-double-cream-camembert croissants, and looked to be spoiling the rest of the day too. Not only that, but Jack hadn't emailed her and the senior Fowls had left for a day on the town, leaving her alone with their increasingly bat-like son.

Dorothea groaned and whacked her head against the back of the sofa, or whatever fancy French name was given to this subtly smug species of seating. Unfortunately, what with it being a rather dry day with incredibly low humidity (mostly due to the fact that Dorothea had tripped over the thermostat), her hair had styled itself into a giant fan, suitable for knocking vases off shelves half a metre above the hair-owner's head. Or, in this case, one vase containing flowers and water.

The vase fell safely onto the luxurious sofa and remained in one glistening piece. The flowers were strewn- some slightly de-petalled- around it. The water, however, had made a much more interesting landing.

Dripping wet, Dorothea scrabbled around and thrust the blooms haphazardly back into their vase. Then, hair slightly less vertical than before, she made her way upstairs to her rooms. It should be stated here that Dorothea, though rather slack in the areas of hair-styling and fashion, was immensely vain when it came to having 'rooms'. Borrowed rooms, yes, but _her_ borrowed rooms. No longer for Dorothea the indignities of shared bathrooms and living rooms! No longer the drudgery of having to build a million shelves to store stuff on! Why, for the whole two-and-a-bit more weeks she was staying at this lovely mansion, Dorothea had the wonderful freedom of having at least _fifty square metres of floor-space!_ She could throw her books over there, her clothes over there- and there, and there- her homework . . . well, it was somewhere. Probably. Doo-de-doo. . .

Wonderful though the hair-care properties of flower petals were reputed to be, Dorothea decided that water laced with chemicals designed to extend the life of cut plants was not what she wished to marinate her fuzzy locks in. So she had a shower.

A Short Musical Interlude

            "You should really let me do something with your hair," lilted Juliet as she bobbed around the door.

            Dorothea moaned. Not again. Not another day wasted as yet another well-meaning fashion guru sprays and mousses my hair. Another day! Another opportunity lost. Another opportunity to . . . to. . .

            "Oh . . . all right. Sure." What harm could it do? Nothing worse than Beth's attempts, anyway. Poor, deluded, snip-happy Beth.

            "_Great!_" Juliet chirped. "I'll be right back!"

_Oh, god. What's happened to her? _Horrific visions of blonde, bobbing aliens italicising the minds of blonde Irish teenagers flooded Dorothea's mind. Blonde, bobbing, and shrieking OMG!!!!11!!!LOL!!!!111!!!!one!!! Please, no. Please, O-random-deity-listening-in-on-my-thoughts, let not the evils of chatspeak destroy the mind of the only sociable teenager I've met in Ireland.

Within eight and a half minutes, Juliet returned with an armful of hair products and one squishy bottle balancing on her left foot. Now, some people, they'll stay loyal to a single brand forever, forsaking Two-for-One sales and traversing every shop in town in defiance of the dreaded "Out of Stock" signs. Not Juliet. Juliet, true child of the 21st century as she was, set her LushLox alongside her SatinShynz, Splits-be-Gone fraternizing- albeit unwillingly- with a dodgy bottle of Pretty Beauty Lady Hair Go. That particular product had been left on the shelf for this occasion.

As Dorothea's hair began to sag under the weight of various gels and potions, Juliet took up the true mantle of the hairdresser- and began to prattle.

"So, yeah, he is _so_" – Dorothea winced- "out of my life. Can you believe a guy would do something like that? _Totally_ unreasonable."

Dorothea, lulled by hands massaging her head, began to doze.

"So. . . any significant other in _your_ life, Dorothea? Any studly farmers stashed back down south?"

This sudden query surprised Dorothea in the same way small pieces of spheroid metal surprise rabbits. "Nhh-bgrdl- blenk- nnniiiiiiiii. . . Uh, gosh, no. Nonononono." The thought, while being horrible and disturbing, was also quite amusing. After all, Dorothea was the one who, during Computers class at school, actually concentrated on drawing a Photoshop wrench instead of sending lewd emails to her classmates.

"Oh, what? Aren't you, like, fifteen or something? Come on, you've got to have _some _romance in your life. What else are hormones _for_?" It had been a very nice wrench.

"You know, when I've fixed your hair, uhmmm . . . could do something about your nails, too . . . you walk nicely enough, but your lips are _totally_ peeling. Dorothea?"

A very nice wrench, with Sparkles of Doom.

"Dorothea?"

_Doooooooooooooooooom!_

"Uh? I mean, yeah. . . what? Sorry."

"So, you coming to the club tonight?"

"Club?"

"You know, dancing. Some Youth Meet thing- getting kids off the streets and night and all that jazz. Cool music though. You _should _come. I'll lend you some clothes."

            "I've got clothes."

            "Uh-huh." Juliet was obviously a master of patronising sympathy. "Probably still all grungy from being in your suitcase, though. Not really what you want to wear _dancing_."

$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$

"_I'm not going to wear this dancing!_" Dorothea shrilled before catching herself "- I mean, uh, I'll get cold or, or. . . it'll fall off. . ."

"What? Oh, lighten up, it's _fine_. We're going to a _club_."

"But-"

"There'll be _boys._"

"It's a serviette. A _sparkly serviette_."

$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$

            "I don't suppose you could offer any viable reason for wearing what appears to be a pocket-handkerchief."

Irish accent- check.

Sneering drawl- check.

Total lack of any human mind at work behind glacial eyes- check.

Dorothea spun to face Artemis, kohled eyes shining with indignation. Well, shining because Juliet had started giggling over some guy who was supposed to show up at the 'club', and a giggling Juliet isn't very accurate with a kohl stick. "It's not a pocket-handkerchief. If you had any life outside of your _fricking_ computers, you'd know that only freaks wear pocket-handkerchiefs. This-" she flicked her hand towards her top "-is a serviette."

And with that, she stalked off, revelling in the sense of silky, _flat_ hair against her neck. And back. Oh, gods, this shirt. No, not a shirt- the word 'shirt' implied an article of clothing with both a front and a back. This barely had one of the two. And the partial one that it did have was covered in silver sequins.

And on top of all that, Dorothea had actually Talked Back to someone. Quite lamely and American-teenager-on-a-sitcom-y to be sure, but still- not like her at all. Not like her at all. It must be the sequined top.

Sparkly Sequins of Dooooooooooooom!

"You ready to go, 'Rea? Big bro's waiting." Juliet had gone to even further lengths to 'glam herself up' as she had for Dorothea; that is, where Dorothea looked like something out of _Chicago_, Juliet glinted and shimmered and shone like a psychedelic Christmas tree. "Get your butt into _gear_."

The trip into town was hardly unusual- both girls froze half to death, having forgotten, it seemed, winter; Butler refused to travel more than 60km/h on the country roads, and Juliet shed what must have been half a kilo of pink glitter onto the interior of the car. This left her with approximately three and a half kilos left on her face and clothing- not to mention her shoes.

Oh, those shoes.

To get an idea of the designer miracle- or travesty- that was Juliet's new pair of shoes, envisage a pair of ballet slippers, the ones with the ribbons that criss-cross up your legs. Except they're made out of shiny, cerise-coloured faux crocodile skin, and the ribbons have pink rhinestones of various shades spaced at regular intervals along them- as do the fifteen-centimetre heels. The open heels are trimmed with rhinestones too. _And_ the sides of the soles. The ribbons were also tipped with glitter-crusted plastic globes which were, surprisingly, pink.

She was wearing matching gloves.

Dorothea herself was dressed a little more modestly. Where Juliet had turned to imitation reptile, Dorothea shied away towards a pair of simple black sandals (with silvery clasps set with purple plastic 'stones', admittedly. But let it pass). Where Juliet had curled and primped and beglittered, Dorothea simply let her (Straight! Sleek! Shiny!) hair swish around free (apart from a silvery clasp set with a purple plastic 'stone'. But as Juliet said, Accessorizing is, like, necessary!) in matt brown curtains. Where Juliet had invested in an oversized belt, Dorothea had blushed and stuttered and clung defensively to a skirt with black and blue swirls on it. Where Juliet had decided on a single-shouldered (and pink) rhinestone-spotted shirt, Dorothea had- well. The serviette. Enough said, and a bit of a let-down really: she'd been going so well with the rest of her outfit.

Dorothea sneezed on some stray glitter, and shivered. It had begun to snow, and the heavy flakes were already building up at the corners of the car windows.

"Juliet-"

"Yeah?"

"What's this party going to be like?" Dorothea, after all, had never been to anything bigger than a Year 8 fundraising social.

"Oh, you know. Music, dancing, boys. Some potheads and so on, but they usually get weeded out and taken to the cops 'fore long. Whole thing's supervised, but it's not too bad. Madame Fowl wouldn't let me take you to a _proper _party." Dorothea grinned. "Doesn't let _me_ go to them either. Damn."

"We're here." Butler informed the girls.

A blast of frigid air struck Dorothea as soon as she clambered out of the car, and for the first- no, make that eighty-second- time, she regretted wearing the serviette. Not only was it extremely small, it seemed to have an 'attitude', which Dorothea was trying not to let rub off on her. In fact, were it not for the (sequin-enhanced) bandage on her arm, Dorothea would have-

Oh, cripes. The bandage. She'd been _shot._ Why was she going to a party? What could she possibly be thinking, going to a freaking dance when she should be at the Manor, resting, eating mints. Watching trashy movies and bemoaning her pathetic social life but instead, instead she was going to a, a teenage nightclub which would mean she. . . actually. . . might. . . have. . . a. . . social. . . life.

Oh.

Well.

That was an entirely different story, then. Bring it on.

$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$--$

The first thing that hit Dorothea, even before she got in the door, was the noise of course. It beat a tattoo against her forehead like someone crushing mallowpuffs between her eyes. It screeched. It pounded. It made the _WEEeeeeEEiiIIIiiIInnnNNNnnG_ noise you get when you run a pick up and down the vibrating string of an electric guitar. It rocked.

After the music, nothing made much of an impact. The strobe lights flickered against the disco balls, but the walls sang with bass. Dry ice smoked up the floor, the percussion beat matched every dancer's heart.

And the entry fee may have been steep, but the lead singer stole your soul.

"WHAT IS THIS MUSIC????" Dorothea screamed in Juliet's ear.

"HUH????"

"WHAT!!! IS!!! THIS!!! MUSIC!!!????"

"I!!! DUNNO!!! SOME!!! POM!!! I!!! THINK!!!"

"OH!!! COOL!!!"

"DO!!! YOU!!! WANT!!! A!!! DRINK!!!????"

"NAH!!! I'LL!!! BE!!! RIGHT!!! THANKS!!! ALL!!! THE !!! SAME!!!"

"O!!! K!!! SEE!!! YOU!!! SOON!!!"

The pink figure slid off through the gyrating dancers, followed by the cloud of pink glitter that marked her progress through the room.

The crowds closed in, and Dorothea danced. The lead singer was great- moonlight-blond hair that changed colours under the strobes, green-blue-violet-orange-white-lavender-maroon-blue-red. . .

Red. . .

**Author's Note:** I updated the last chapter, so no more barely-explanatory diary entries for Chapter 11! Sorry this update has been so long coming, but insert all previous excuses here.


	13. Chapter 13: Will You, Won't You Join the...

**Chapter 13: Will You, Won't You Join the Dance?**

_Red hair.__ Why did I stop dancing because he looked like he had red hair? _

_Because you're nuts.__ Face it, girl, you're talking to yourself._

_Thinking.__ Thinking to myself. Talking implies speech, I'm not speeching, speaking. _

_Why ever not? Talk to that guy._

_Uuh?___

_That one! Quick! He's hot and he's getting away! _

Indeed, to the average heterosexual female eye, the male human walking past Dorothea was reasonably good-looking. Nothing special. Quite pale, dark hair that flicked into a kiss-curl on his forehead, midnight-blue eyes framed by smoky lashes. . .

_Eeeyaack! He looks like a nice sort of, of Artemis!_

_No! No! Don't think that! Flirt! Flirt, damn you!_

Shocked beyond words and working jaw muscles, Dorothea simply stood and gaped as the boy left, looking somewhat disturbed by this strange girl. Inconsolable in defeat, the spirit of the serviette stumbled to the back of Dorothea's consciousness and melted made spiteful remarks about Dorothea's clothing, hair and sexual orientation.

Gradually, Dorothea regained the use of her jaw muscles and closed her mouth.

Of course, by then it had already been twenty-three minutes and there was quite a large gap between herself and the other party-goers. The Artemis look-a-like was long gone and apparently Juliet had run out of glitter, because Dorothea couldn't see the blonde girl's shimmering cloud anywhere. Trying to catch the eyes of a few passers-by only heightened her paranoia that yes, everyone thought she was a freak. A drooling, frizzy-haired freak. The type of person no one wants to associate themselves with, lest everyone thought that they, too, would be uncool by association. Or maybe they just thought she was stoned; staring slack-jawed into space for half an hour gives that sort of impression.

Dorothea began to feel incredibly annoyed. Everything about this place, from the backwards plugholes to the psychotic gun-wielding maniacs to the ramrod-stiff vampire boys who lives in castles on the tops of hills. . . well, ground-that-was-slightly-higher-than-the-surrounding-countryside, they were all despicable. This country didn't even have proper birds. Where were the bellbirds? The fantails? The kereru, sitting on power lines and making them sag several metres before falling off and lumbering through the air to a sturdier perch? Where?

Fine, then. She would dance.

And so, Dorothea Danella Danielle Smith danced like she never had before because of course, Dorothea being a nice girl, she had never attended any sort of dance apart from barn dances with her parents. The dynamics of a mosh pit were completely new to her.

For those readers who are also nice girls/boys/pots of geraniums, a description of a mosh pit is probably needed. Imagine, if you will, a wooden stage elevated some one-and-a-half to two metres above the floor. Directly in front of the stage is a small area fenced off with iron scaffolding and containing three bouncers whose job it is to make sure no unruly teenagers jump at the stage and electrocute themselves on the wiring. In front of that are the unruly teenagers. . . jumping, screaming, waving hands clenched into horns and making up a pulsing heaving mass of sweat and elbows and flying hair getting up your nose and in your eyes and strobe lights and people, people everywhere shoving you, ramming you, pushing you down under the feet until someone else grabs your arm and then you're back, pushing screaming jumping flying-

-and, exhausted, stumbling over to the punch bowl to get a drink. Really, she was surprised that more people didn't die of mosh-induced dehydration. Heh. _Well, stranger things have happened,_ she mused. _After all, my hair is quite straight at the moment. . . _she also wasn't certain that all the sweat on her serviette was hers. Ew. Well, at least it was still on her. And the band wasn't half bad. The singer's hair was a bit odd though, it looked. . .

Hmm. . .

Well, Dorothea finally had to admit that it was a mullet. A cool mullet, though. That is, as cool as it is possible for a mullet to be in this day and age. And the bleached-out colour gave it a sort of halo look as the singer gasped out a final refrain before taking a running jump off the stage. Dorothea dipped herself another cup of punch before sliding into one of the plastic chairs that stood- mostly upside down- around the walls of the hall. Singer-boy was surfing the mosh-pit, a flying haloed alien above his glittering worshippers. . .

Ooh, er. The room flicked up and down as Dorothea twisted her head to follow a wave of pink. Well she thought it'd been a wave. Could have been Juliet. What time was it? Dorothea wanted to dance. . .

The room twisted again and exploded into scarlet sparkles as the floor danced towards Dorothea's face.

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

"Are you sure she'll be all right?"

"Look out for her _arm_, idiot."

"Her arm? But-"

"She probably just fainted from the excitement, you know. You know how girls ge-"

_Thwack._

Dorothea creaked open one eye. The ground was moving, and she was upright. But her legs weren't moving. Funny. . . someone was lying on the floor. Wasn't she lying on the floor?

"Someone probably spiked the bloody punch again. Geez, don't they know it's only funny once? That car, the black one- _watch her arm!_"

No, she was upright. And she had white hair in her face. Not her hair, she had straight brown hair. Haha, straight. Person on the floor didn't have much hair. Was on the snow anyway. Snow on the floor?

"_So-_rry. But I don't see-"

Or. . . outside? Snow, outside, yes. Very good. Top marks with cherry. Person on floor going away. Sore stomach- shoulder? Shoulder in stomach? Not her shoulder. Not flexible enough. White-hair shoulder? Pink shouting. Door. Ow, door and head. Oooch.

"Whuh?"

"Oh, 'Rea, hell, you're awake. Great! Some dickhead spiked the drink, y'know, probably some stupid schoolkid huh. . . you all right? Cool! This is Trip, he rescued you from the moshers. . ." Something about the voice skidded numbingly along Dorothea's consciousness as she tried to place it. Sounded… pink.

"Ju'et?"

"Yeah, babe. Hi! So we're just gonna take you home, don't worry, Miz Angeline will give the organisers absolute sh- er, he- er, will totally bust the organisers' ba- er, damn. You sure you're all right? Cool. Yeah, watch your arm there. So, Trip. . ."

Legs, two, there. Arms, two, there. Weren't you supposed to take it-at-itinerararararies? Head, one. . . here. Yep. Hair, straight- no, frizzy- there, there, and there. And over there. Um. What else?

The journey home was quite uneventful; Juliet smiled a lot at the strange rescuer Trip and Dorothea puzzled over whether people had two eyes or just three and a nose. Or wings. Ooh, wings. Fun.

OK, out the door. Snow, ooh, want a jersey. With a clown on it. No, too small that one now have a green one oh 'nother door good warm bright oh yuck. Oh no no no. . .

"Juliet-" the slim youth's eyes widened almost imperceptibly: "Dorothea?"

It was too much.

"I'm _SOOOOOOOOOORRRRRR-YYYYYYYYYYY-_uhh. . . hic. . ." bawled Dorothea, legs giving way. Someone held her up as she continued to wail, "I-I did-d-dn't mean tooooo, I'm sorry sorry sorry didn't mean iiiiiiit-t-hhhhi. . ."

She had to tell him, it was too too cruel and big-

"D-didn't mmmean to think you were li-i-ike thaaat, didn't mean it y-you don't not h-have a mind meant not human mind meant c-comp-pcom- machine. Mean' no feelins like machin' not lik-ke stupid meant . . . meant. . . zzzz. . ."

The arms carried her upstairs and she fell asleep.


End file.
